Tuesday, March 21, 2017

It took just a week or so, the end of a grueling road trip, some rest and some work on the home court. The Golden State Warriors rattled off five straight wins, including four blowouts, the last two on back-to-back visits to competitive western teams, OKC Thunder and Dallas Mavericks. OKC and the Milwaukee Bucks were hot, until their winning streaks were crushed by the Warriors.

And they did it without Kevin Durant in the lineup.

Curry and Thompson got their shot back but other members of the team responded to the challenge and the opportunity, particularly in the Dallas win.

Meanwhile San Antonio dropped two and are 2.5 back of the Dubs after briefly being in first for the best record.

The most challenging stretch left on the Warriors' regular schedule is next week, when they play back to backs in Houston and San Antonio, and then immediately host Houston again. But it does not look like the home court in the playoffs will depend only on that game in San Antonio.

The Warriors now can be confident that they can compete and even dominate without Durant, though he seems to be healing on or ahead of schedule. On these last two games with tough opponents, their defense was stifling and their 3 point shooting awesome. They out-rebounded the Mavs. The offensive flow was back, and so was the joy.

The big news for the San Francisco Giants is the return of Barry Bonds, in an official if advisory capacity with duties that sound pretty ad hoc but the symbolism is important. Plus his baseball intelligence is extraordinary.

But other news not so great--after most of spring training passed without injury, there were a slew of them late: hamstring for Michael Morse, trying to return to the team; quad injury for Mac Williamson, and the worst, arm injury for pitcher Will Smith, requiring Tommy Johns surgery.